


Bled and Purged

by Arlome



Category: Poldark (TV 2015), Poldark - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-08
Updated: 2018-01-08
Packaged: 2019-03-02 09:03:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,417
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13314900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arlome/pseuds/Arlome
Summary: The incredible news reaches her in London.





	Bled and Purged

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dismiss_your_fearsx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dismiss_your_fearsx/gifts).



> This little thing is a birthday present for a lovely woman whom I love dearly.  
> Megan, you're amazing:)

The incredible news reaches her in London.

Not long after her unplanned arrival to Town, Caroline is taken ill. She is burning with fever – the usual London summer illness, one would say – but she suspects that the reason for this bodily failure is far eerier; far more dramatic and completely uncharacteristic of the person she always fancied herself to be. The fever, as Dwight would undoubtedly say, is only a symptom. No, she is different from all the poor wretches that moan in pain and toss and turn in their sweat-soaked beds, for she is burning with the despicable force of rejection and is probably mortally ill with unrequited love. 

A physician is summoned almost at once and is shown into her room – a dreadfully decorated bedroom; with pink wallpaper and large red bows at the curtains hanging from the four-poster bed. He is a large man in his early forties, with a carefully trimmed wig and a growing belly of still somewhat proportional size. His dark eyes are sympathetic and not unkind, but his fashionable clothes and his pretentious London accent sink a hole in Caroline's heart. Dr John Hamlin – for that is his name – bleeds her and purges her, and as she lies in her bed, bleeding into a bowl with bile rising in her throat, Caroline thinks woozily that Dwight – gentle, kind, unsuspectingly handsome Dwight – would never have done so; he'd have never let her blood willingly. 

Dr Hamlin packs away his knife, having performed his butchering duty, and regards his patient with interest.

"Forgive me, Miss Penvenen," he begins, drawing the attention of the wilting flower lying in the large bed, "but your esteemed aunt tells me you have recently arrived from Cornwall?"

Caroline clears her throat and painfully flexes the fingers of her bleeding right arm. 

"I have," she answers quietly, "I've been spending the last couple of months in my uncle's company; he lives near Truro."

This bit of news seems to greatly animate the doctor and he springs from his seat with great vigour one does not usually see in a man of his size.

"Near Truro! Why that is tremendous!" he exclaims, pacing a couple of steps and then turning towards the bed again, "tell me, Miss Penvenen; have you perhaps heard of a young physician by the name of Enys? He works in those parts, I am told?"

Frost – the kind you only get in the dead of winter – creeps into her innards and clutches at them with its frozen fingers; her heart turns to lead, her stomach threatens to overturn. Caroline coughs delicately.

"Dr Dwight Enys and I are acquainted," she says evenly, immeasurably proud of her patrician upbringing and her unique ability to disguise her feelings.

"Are you? Capital!" Dr Hamlin seems particularly keen to engage her in conversation now, and he returns to his seat with great enthusiasm, "tell me, Miss Penvenen; what kind of a man is Dr Enys? I am told he is not yet thirty! Is he a gentleman?"

How does one describe the man for whom one's heart beats and bleeds and flutters to a perfect stranger? Caroline sighs – another uncharacteristic trait! For who would have thought? Caroline Penvenen, sighing for a _man!_ – And she hopes the doctor would attribute this annoying expelling of air to her sickness. 

"He is," she smiles weakly, and flexes her fingers again; the drizzle of blood swells in volume and spills into the silver bowl like fat syrup, "though he rarely moves in genteel circles; nearly all his patients are miners and fisher-folk. He is the sort of man that cares deeply for his ailing customers – even if, and perhaps because, they rarely pay – and he is eight and twenty; quite young, but full of ideals and generosity."

The doctor, who is sitting at the edge of his seat, as giddy as a schoolboy, seems quite shocked at this torrent of information that seems to be thrown in his direction.

"You are quite well informed, my dear lady," he mutters, completely stupefied; no doubt wondering how a wealthy heiress came to know a country doctor with an impoverished clientele _so well._

Understanding that she spoke too much, and damning the illness for it, Caroline smiles a smile that is meant to be brilliant, but is greatly lacking in luminescence instead; even so, it proves to be enough for the doctor, who seems to pull himself to a gratified form of attention at the delicate sight.

"Dr Enys and I became somewhat like friends, after he had saved my life," she says lightly, as if the words just uttered are not the most blatant of lies; as if 'somewhat like friends' can even begin to describe what she and Dwight mean to each other – _meant_ to each other – as if love that was so freely given can be measured in tablespoons, like a tincture, or poison.

Caroline leans her head against the pillow, suddenly tired and spent, and closes her eyes against the dim light of the burning candles. She feels pressure on her arm, and the bending of the elbow; so, the bloodletting is over; perhaps she has bled out all her love?

"Dr Enys saved your life?" the large man asks, pressing her forearm upwards, "in what way?"

"He removed a piece of fishbone from my throat," Caroline says, her eyes still closed, "the entire area was very inflamed, and I could not swallow. Dwi,- Dr Enys, was all modesty afterwards, but there can be no doubt in my mind that I owe my life to him."

Her voice catches at the end, and she feels dizzy. A cup of Canary wine is brought to her lips.

"Drink, Miss Penvenen," the commanding voice of Dr Hamlin registers in her mind, and she wills her heavy eyes to open, "this will revive you." 

Caroline drinks a few hearty gulps of the sweet liquid and feels the warmth spreading through her chest and upper stomach. She turns her gaze to the man sitting now at the edge of her bed and looking somewhat abashed.

"I should not have taxed you so," he says apologetically and smiles, and for a moment, Caroline can see that ten or maybe fifteen years ago, this man was probably quite handsome, "I will let you rest now."

"Nonsense," she says, her voice and demeanour invigorated by the spirits, "I should like to know of your interest in Dr Enys; we are, after all, friends."

Another semi-brilliant smile, some fluttering of somewhat heavy eyelids and the doctor yields; she has a way with men, she nearly always gets what she wants. _Nearly always –_

"Well, Miss Penvenen," the doctor begins as he takes the wrist of her left hand to check her pulse, "young Enys performed a remarkable operation upon a woman with the utmost success; but I wouldn't dare to disclose any details, for it is quite gruesome and –"

"I am not as squeamish as you might think, Dr Hamlin," Caroline interrupts him, eager against her better judgment to hear of Dwight and his victories; to be reassured of her decisions, to know that the heartache was not in vain, "You may tell me all the gory details, I quite revel in the Gothic and the Macabre!"

Dr Hamlin arches a sarcastic eyebrow and allows half a smile to form on his face. Satisfied that his patient will not faint, he moves back to the chair.

"Oh, another fan of Mrs Radcliff, I gather? Very well, I shall tell you; but then you really must rest, Miss Penvenen."

Betraying nothing of her anxiety at the prospect of hearing news of her lover, Caroline smiles wanly and nods; her head feels heavy.

"You have my word, Dr Hamlin."

Satisfied at the promise, the heavy doctor begins his account: "in short, young Enys delivered an ill woman of her child by cutting her belly open; the surprising outcome of this centuries-old operation is that both patients survived! It is the first documented successful procedure in England so far!"

Caroline is feeling faint again. She wonders if it the cause of this weakness is the news or the amount of blood she was relieved of.

"Is that so?" she asks feebly; thankfully, Dr Hamlin is excited again, and does not seem to notice his patient's emotional distress.

"It is, Ma'am!" he exclaims, slapping his palms against his knees, "I have it on the very best authority. Indeed, from the very man Dr Enys studied Midwifery under, Dr Leake of Craven Street! But Leake did say that he was not surprised in the slightest and that Enys was always brilliant, even in his studies. In fact, the old man said that he always considered the young man as one of his very best students!"

Caroline closes her eyes, muting the sound of the doctor's voice. 

A small, warm glow of pride builds a fire in her belly. That good man; that brilliant, _brilliant_ man, how excellent his skills are and how right she was by mentioning them to him. She keeps her eyes shot, the excited chatter of the _wrong_ doctor buzzing in her ears. She's proud, immensely proud; her chest is tight with all these new feelings that threaten to choke her to death. _How good it is that I left him in Cornwall,_ she thinks melancholically, her innards aching with contained despair, _how very beneficial for his one true love!_

_Am I not the noblest of women?_

She wipes the few tears that dare squeeze past her eyelids, cross at this blatant show of emotion.

"Miss Penvenen, are you quite well?" comes the unwanted inquiry.

Caroline smiles and nods, her eyes still closed.

"Oh yes," she says, her voice falsely cheerful, "Oh yes; quite well, thank you. It's my eyes; they suddenly became irritated; I think I should like to rest now…"

 

After this initial visit, Caroline is bled and purged a couple more times, during which Dr Hamlin tries to repeatedly draw her into conversations, but she does not respond. She cannot discuss her solitary Cornish doctor with him again. Once was enough; once was quite enough.

The image of Dwight's face rises before her eyes late at night when sleep fails her. The soft, plump lips, the pale blue eyes – kind and loving; he is _so handsome,_ almost angelic, even.

Caroline does not cry, but her heart is heavy. She wonders if it can be bled, too.

***

A few weeks after Uncle Ray's return to Cornwall, Captain Poldark pays Caroline a visit. He is announced and ushered into the parlour where she sits with a book she can barely concentrate on. He strolls in, tall and dark, attractive in a non-assuming way; the scar on his face pale against his tan cheek. 

"Captain Poldark!" she cries and flashes her brilliant smile, all too ready to play the hostess, "to what do I owe the _pleasure?"_

They exchange pleasantries and talk almost flirtatiously about Cornwall and Poldark's gratitude and indebtedness to her – both notions which she dismisses with her slightly sardonic smile and a sharp sentence or two – until the man, never one to beat around the bush, decides to congratulate her on her non-existing engagement to Lord Coniston. Things seem to go downhill from there, and Caroline turns a tad defensive, and then sarcastic, and finally – when the Captain tells her that he cannot believe that she no longer cares for Dwight – speechless. She's lost for words, something of a novelty to her, and in order to try and pry herself out of the situation, she brings up the only subject she can think of that will take this man's mind away from his hopeless mission.

"This subject is far too dreary to my taste," she utters suddenly and smiles, "let us talk of something else; tell me, Captain; is it true what they say? Did Dr Enys perform some kind of a miracle on a pregnant, rickets-infested woman?"

Poldark, though quite taken aback at this change of direction, recovers quickly and sends her a smile of his own.

"It is indeed," he confirms, not missing a beat, and seemingly quite proud of his good friend, "Dwight is nothing short of a miracle worker…it seems that he is to go into history as the first English physician to successfully perform this operation with a double positive outcome!" 

Caroline's chest is tight, and she momentarily forgets her resolve to bypass the subject of the fateful parting that brought her to London, alone, instead of to another city and in company. 

"You see now, so I have done right," she says before she can commend her mouth to stop, and she smiles sarcastically, but the edges of her ridicule are blunt, and some real emotion seems to be seeping through, "for if I had spirited Dr Enys away to Bath, that poor woman and her child would be dead and buried now. So tell me, Captain; where is my shiny medal for services rendered to the Poor of Cornwall?"

"Caroline…" The man says exasperatedly, no doubt a little shocked at the rapid changes in the conversation and at the bitter cynicism in one so young.

"Come now, my dear man," she says, stopping him before he can sigh his way into her heart and crumble her resolution, "you know me to be right. Dwight Enys is the noblest of men – you think so, I think so; evidently, the Navy thinks so too. ..It seems it was essential for us to part."

"I do not believe it," the Captain exclaims, shaking the dark mane of curls on his head, "I do not believe it, Caroline!" 

She sighs, unbelievably wretched, and looks away from him; unable to keep his hazel gaze any longer. Poldark sees into her very soul – God only knows how! – and the pain of this transparency is too much for her to bear. 

"Do you still love him?" he asks again, quietly, as if he's resigned to rejection. And Caroline finds herself quite unable to lie.

"Extravagantly!" she says, almost vehemently, and her eyes shine with fire that's reflected in the Captain's eyes.

He moves closer to her on the sofa, further dwarfing the entire room with his larger-than-life presence. _In another life,_ she thinks, _I could have loved_ this _man._

"Then come with me to see him off!" he implores, and takes her cool hand, pressing it tightly between both of his, "least the man we _both_ love does something foolish in His Majesty's Service and dies!"

It's too much. It's all too much. This man, with his stifling presence and his manly demeanour, is choking her with his unmistakable, radiating masculinity. He's crowding her with his absolute assurance in himself and in his powers to persuade; in short, it is as if he is placing a mirror before her, and is pressing her to fight herself and lose. She yanks her hand out of his reach and moves away from him.

"No, no!" she mutters, "it is quite out of the question. Have you come to bully me into submission, Captain?"

"I have, Miss Penvenen," he says, but does not move further from his seat, least he alienates her even more, "I've come to bully you for your own good."

"So men _are_ all odiously conceited," she sighs privately and is secretly delighted to notice how puzzled her companion looks. 

"Well, then you are to be gravely disappointed," she says aloud instead, already ill again with this interview and the recollections and sorrows it resurrects, "no good can come of Dwight and I meeting again, Captain; the future holds nothing but heartache and disappointment for us."

Poldark regards her with frustration and not a small amount of pity in his lovely eyes; then, at last, resigned to her judgment, he sighs heavily and shrugs.

"Well, I feared this outcome," he says and smiles sadly, "but if your heart is set –"

"It is," Caroline lies easily, eager to put this excruciating exchange to rest.

The tall man looks at her for a long while without speaking; then he nods again.

"Very well," he agrees finally, "but at least do me the honour of escorting you back to Cornwall; no doubt you will wish to set out without further delay, now that your uncle is in poor health."

Caroline's head jerks at the last comment; her heart sinks in her chest in trepidation and concern. She turns to the man sitting next to her on the sofa in dismay; he seems to know her choices before she makes them.

"Uncle Ray is ill?"

***

She lies atop of him, her soft belly pressed firmly against his hard one. They are sharing a few lazy kisses, freely bestowed in post-coital bliss, as if they have all the time in the world instead of a few precious hours before he goes to sea; his hands are based low on the small of her back, so that the last two fingers of each hand are resting against the delicate swell of her backside. Her hair falls on his shoulders and tickles his cheeks, and he chuckles breathlessly against her mouth, the motion shaking her and soon, she laughs too; her fingers drumming on his biceps and elbows.

There's a rusty-brown spot on the sheets where she lay but a few minutes ago, before Dwight flipped them over, thus trapping himself under a shower of tickling gold, and the sight of it – the knowledge of _how_ it came to be there – fills her with a somewhat silly sense of giddy pride. She's just become a woman on these coarse linen sheets, with this man, in this boisterous town full of merchants and sailors. Her innocence – if there ever really was much of it in her – is put to rest; spirited away in a frenzied flurry of passion and love and – for once – _good_ decisions. The whole ordeal is over fairly fast, and he apologizes profusely for it – it's the excitement of finally being with her, the joy of having her cling to him, the feel of her skin against his; next time he'll last, next time, they'll – but she finds that she does not mind in the slightest. The briefness suits her, for she feels somewhat overwhelmed by the whole situation; the odd sensation of lying in bed, naked, with a man –despite of how good looking he is – rattles her slightly, but the feel of him moving against her, _inside_ her, proves to be very pleasant, despite the initial pain. 

Dwight looks up as if reading her thoughts, and his kind, comely eyes seem to shimmer in semi-darkness.

"No regrets?" he asks huskily; one of his hands comes to brush a few disobedient curls behind her ear. Caroline shakes her head.

"None," she replies with certainty, "and you?"

He nods, but he's smiling and biting his lower lip as if trying not to laugh.

"One," he says archly, "I find myself somewhat unpatriotic as of the last few hours."

Caroline laughs, and Dwight joins in, and soon they are pressed even tighter together in mirth; her breasts brush against his chest, and one of his knees slips between her thighs. She feels him stirring against her hip; invigorated by his reaction to her body, she decides to act upon it.

Dwight jumps at the inquisitive touch of her fingers, clearly startled, and stays her hand.

"What is it?" she asks innocently, her lips soft against his ear, "is my touch unpleasant?" 

"Oh no," he replies, his voice catching, but he does not release her hand, "Oh no; but…my love, you are not yet recovered, I think we shouldn't-"

"Don't you rather think it is for me to decide?" she breathes and leans down to kiss his open mouth hungrily. Dwight chokes down a moan and rolls them over so that Caroline is on her back once more. She smiles triumphantly for a moment, ready to accept him again, but he moves away from her, and her smile falters.

"Trust me, Caroline," he explains placatingly, his thumb gliding over her cheek and her lips, "you may not feel it now, but there will be soreness; perhaps, before I am to leave, at dawn…"

Realizing that she should probably adhere to his more superior knowledge on this subject, she kisses his thumb in acquiescence, and Dwight smiles. 

"So, you are not cross with me?" he asks tenderly.

"I am not cross with you," she answers in the same tone, and glories in the way his face breaks into a brilliant smile, even in near darkness.

"Come here," Dwight says and pulls her towards him, embracing her with his right arm and pulling her against his side. They lie still for a few moments, until Caroline, suddenly remembering a hideously decorated sickroom in London, raises her head and leans her chin against Dwight's shoulder. 

"Dr Enys," she quips, but not without a dab of seriousness, "tell me about that smart operation you performed on that poor woman; the pregnant one, with rickets." 

Dwight looks down his nose at her, surprised at this unexpected request, but also genuinely pleased with her interest in his work.

"Do you really wish to know?" he asks, his lips arching in an astonished little smile.

Caroline nods and kisses the hard shoulder under her chin.

"I do," she says, running the fingers of her right hand up his arm, "truly."

Dwight doesn't need much encouraging; for all his excessive modesty, he's all too happy to discuss this case with her. His miraculous success is still a wonder to him; he cannot quite make out why he's succeeded where all the rest before him failed. Luck, he suspects, has almost everything to do with it. 

"Mrs Williams, the wife of George Williams who works at Ross' mine, is crippled with rickets from infanthood," Dwight begins, placing his left hand behind his head and staring at the ceiling, Caroline pressed firmly against his right side, "against everyone's better judgment, she conceived – as you know, the poor can rarely regulate these matters – and when her time came, I was sent for. I noticed immediately that normal delivery was not an option, and after much deliberation with Mr Williams – for the poor lady was beyond reason with pain at that time – I have decided to cut through layers of skin, and fat and muscle to try and save the mother from an excruciatingly painful death," Caroline shivers, and Dwight reaches with his left hand for the blankets, which he draws over them to drive away the cold; he pillows his head on his arm again and turns to kiss Caroline's hair before resuming his tale, " I gave Mrs Williams laudanum, so that she wouldn't feel the pain of the surgery, and on the dirty kitchen table – which I did my best to scrub clean – I cut her open and extracted, to my great surprise, a living, healthy boy out of her gaping womb. Then, I stitched the fainted woman as fast as I could, and packed the wound and prayed to God that fever and infection do not take her. Imagine my surprise when, against all the odds, Mrs Williams did not die from blood loss at the surgery, nor from gangrene or postpartum fever afterwards! She truly is a wonder…"

 _"You_ are a wonder," Caroline says, deeply affected by this man's modest brilliance. Dwight colours and shakes his head, laughing a little in abashed awkwardness. 

"No, no," he assures her, "It is all luck, and the ability of the patient to follow instructions; I only cut and stitched fast."

Caroline rises slightly and props herself on her left elbow, and pushes at Dwight playfully.

"Stop being so modest!" she admonishes him, and he smiles, though still a little ill at ease, "Say what you wish, you _are_ a miracle worker!" 

But before he can object again, Caroline grows silent and pensive; sensing the change of atmosphere in the room, Dwight raises his head a little and reaches out to touch her arm.

"Caroline?" he asks tenderly, tentatively; she peeks at him from behind her curls, a sad smile playing on her lips.

"It was right, then," she admits finally, a little reluctant to disclose her vulnerability, even to him, " The separation, the _heartache;_ it was right…two lives saved, and countless more of your precious fisher-folk, no doubt. See, it appears that I am not such a selfish monster, after all…"

Dwight pushes himself off the bed and grabs her startled face in his hands before kissing her fiercely, almost painfully, in his need to make her _see._

"Stop it, Caroline!" he pleads with her, leaning his forehead against hers, "What good does it do to dwell on it? Here we are now, closer than we have ever hoped to be; will we not take heart in this?"

"You are leaving tomorrow," she whispers brokenly, her hands gripping his biceps almost painfully, "and when you return to these shores, we do not know –"

"Two years," Dwight interrupts her, pulling her into a firm embrace, "two years at the most, my love; this war will soon be over, and I shall be back in your arms," he kisses her again, and again, and then moves to kiss her neck, and to mutter in her ear: "and in your bed."

"Stop it, Dwight," Caroline begs, quite breathless with his renewed attentions, "least I take no heed of your care for my recovering virginal body."

She feels his smile against the column of her neck, and she pushes him away, almost disgruntled at his antics.

"Forgive me," he says, but he does not appear overly apologetic, "I shall keep to my end of the bed 'till dawn, and not bother you again." 

"You dreadful man," she huffs, collapsing back against the pillows, "you take pleasure in torturing me."

Dwight laughs and leans in to kiss her despite his promises.

"Nothing can be farther from the truth, my love," he says and, having kissed her lips and two cheeks, lies next to her; his fair hair touching her golden curls. Caroline turns on her side and entwines their fingers, pulling him to face her.

"I love you," she says quietly into the sudden void that's been created in their interaction.

"I love you," he echoes softly and brings their interlaced fingers to his lips.

Caroline does not cry, for her heart is full. Bleedings are a thing of the past.

**Author's Note:**

> The idea first came to me from reading a book about the history of medicine, where I came upon a line that said that the first successful C-section was performed in England in the 1790's. Later, after this was already written, I read in another place that it was, in fact, performed by a woman who dressed as a man in order to practice medicine and that the procedure took place at the beginning of the 19th century.
> 
> So, in a way that is quite uncharacteristic of me, I've decided to twist history a bit for the sake of our dear Dr Enys. I hope I am forgiven:)


End file.
